Month: May 2017

I’ve started this series to highlight my favorite real world settings for books and what makes them so good! Feel free to join in on the fun and explore the world through your books!

London

London, London, London. My time with you was much too short. We will meet again, but until then, books.

1.The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

This may be one of the first classic that I really loved, and it was also the first book that helped me realize how awesome creepy books can be. The setting plays a pretty significant role in this book, as it helps visualize the different social parties Dorian associated with, and how the city changed while Dorian stayed the same.

“I don’t want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them.”

2. A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab

If you have read A Darker Shade of Magic you know that the setting an absolute key component, if not the most important component, of the story. Whether you are a fan of Red London, White London, or Grey London, you surly agree that London is the perfect setting for this book.

“I’m not going to die,” she said. “Not till I’ve seen it.”

“Seen what?”

Her smile widened. “Everything.”

3. The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare by G.K. Chesterton

Most of G.K. Chesterton’s work takes place in London, so the setting here is no surprise, but this book happens to be my favorite Chesterton story and it deals with undercover agents in the heart of London. It’s a fantastic story.

“The Iliad is only great because all life is a battle, The Odyssey because all life is a journey, The Book of Job because all life is a riddle.”

4. 1984 by George Orwell

Is this techically in London? I mean it’s supposed to be London but it’s a rather disturbed version of the city…however, I’m counting it! This version of London is one we hope we never see, yet it shows hows easily and blindly people and cultures can be corrupted.

“But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.”

5. The Girl of the Train by Paula Hawkins

This book really takes place outside of London, but when she’s on the train she is headed to London, so in that sense the city is influential to the story. This book surprised me because I thought it lived up to the hype and that doesn’t always happen.

“There’s something comforting about the sight of strangers safe at home.”

6. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

I mean, I don’t really have to explain this one. One could easily argue that these stories are the most influential/popular stories based primarily in London. They were popular when Doyle was alive, and they remain just as popular, if not more, to this day. These stories prove that no matter how hard people try, Sherlock will truly never die.

“I listen to their story, they listen to my comments, and then I pocket my fee.”

And that’s a wrap for London! There are so many others that could be added to my list, but as I’m trying to keep these posts shorter, I’m limited myself to only six. If you have any suggestions of London books for me, please let me know, I love revisiting this city, even if only in books!

Everything I Need to Know I Learned From A Little Golden Book by Diane Muldrow

When I was little, my mom used to take me grocery shopping with her, as most mothers do, but instead of dragging me along with her other 4 kids, she would drop me off in front of The Little Golden Book display, and I would sit there and look through book after book until she was done shopping. I would then beg her to get one (or all) of the books, but as we were a large, one-income family, I almost never got my wish. However, my mom would console me by assuring me the books would be waiting for me the next time we came to the store.

These days, mother’s would cringe (as do I and my mom when we think back on it) and probably call my mom out on every form of social media for leaving her child unattended in a grocery store, but we all know back in the early 90’s, this was completely acceptable. While I wouldn’t dream of doing that now, I have to say those trips I spent sitting on a cold grocery store floor are some of my fondest memories of books as a child.

I was a very slow reader (thanks a lot, dyslexia), so reading was very very frustrating for me. I really thought I would never be able to read. I know for a lot of kids like me, the frustration turns into an indifference or even a hatred of reading, but my love of books stayed and when my ability to read finally clicked in my brain, I took off in turbo mode and soon I was reading everything I could get my hands on. As silly as it sounds, I give quite a lot of credit to the Little Golden Books.

These books are fun, uplifting, beautifully illustrated, and highly appealing to kids. I never thought, however, that those books had real life lessons in them until this weekend when my mom gave me Everything I Need to Know I Learned From A Little Golden Book by Diane Muldrow, the editorial director at Golden Books. This book takes the themes from the books and shows us just how they formed us as children.

For example, do you have money problems? Well you should read 5 Pennies to Spend, which teaches you how to budget properly. Do you feel stuck in one place? Read Open Up My Suitcase and plan that dream vacation. Stressed out? Take a page out of The Little Red Hen and take a day off when you need it.

This book is so cute and it really took me back to my childhood. Pick it up for your kids, your little siblings, as a graduation present, or just for you!

Today is the 40th anniversary of Star Wars, so I’m reposting the tag I made for May the 4th Be With You day.

There aren’t really any rules of you want to do this tag, just tag me so I can read your answers!
So, without further ado:

Long ago in a galaxy far, far away….

I. The Phantom Menance: A book (or series) you pretend not to like but secretly do (guilty pleasure).

Percy Jackson and The Olympians by Rick Riodan. I’m an adult, these book are for children, I’m an adult, these books are for children…maybe if I keep telling myself that, I’ll one day believe it 😉

II. The Clone Wars: An emotionally powered YA novel.

Kissed by an Angel by Elizabeth Chandler. I read this series in high school, and I finished it in 3 days, which is shocking for me because it’s close to 700 pages–I was totally captivated! I reread some of it a few years ago and I was cracking up because it was so emotional and drama filled, not at all like something I would like now.

III. The Revenge of the Sith: A Trilogy with a tragic end.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. I really had a hard time with Mockingjay and the ending just devastated me.

IV. A New Hope: Your favorite classic.

I have so many favorite classics it’s really hard to choose, but for this one I’m going to say A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens.

V. The Empire Stikes Back: An action packed adventure.

The Shades of Magic Series by V.E. Schwab. I haven’t yet read the third one, so this might be premature, but the first two are non-stop action!

VI. The Return of the Jedi: A trilogy with a wonderfully satisfying ending.
I’m gunna have to go with my favorite trilogy, The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. This ending just feels right. You’ve gone on a long, hard journey full of suffering and doubt, but at the end there is peace.

VII. The Force Awakins: A new book that feels like an old friend.

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. Oh this book warmed my soul. It really felt like I was sitting down with a friend and having a nice long chat.

VIII. The Last Jedi: A sequel you can’t wait to read.

I don’t think she has a title for it yet, but I can’t wait to read the next book in the Ember in the Ashes series. I was delightfully surprised by how much I enjoyed this series.

Bonus: Rogue One: your favorite spinoff

I don’t read a lot of spinoffs, but I did read Finn by Jon Clinch, and I really enjoyed it. It is about Huckleberry Finn’s father and it is very interesting.
There you have it, kids, my first ever book tag! If you love Star Wars and love books, I would love for you to do this tag! Just remember to pingback to me or this post so I can see your answers!!
I tag all you Star Wars fans out there!

I’ve been in a horrible reading slump as of late, and it’s really wearing me out. As someone who decompresses by reading, I really feel the strain not wanting to read has on me.

This slump has drastically affected my reviewing pace as well, I feel like either the books I’ve finished haven’t been reviewable or I just haven’t finished many books since I’ve been working on some longer ones recently. Having a book blog really adds the pressure to review what you read, and I’m sorry for not having many quality reviews lately 😦 I’ll get out of the slump soon, I’m sure!

Anyway, sometimes when I’m in a reading/writing slump, I look to my favorite authors, and I’ll share some of my favorite quotes from them (about reading, writing, life, or all three).

Well, let’s hope I get out of my slump, but in the meantime, if any of you wonderful bibliophiles have any suggestions, such as tips or quick reads you think will help get me back on track, please let me know!

Today for our Top Ten Tuesday, the Broke and Bookish Blog gave us a Summer Freebie. I actually just did a small form of this blog for my Friday Five post last week, so I’m going to try to name books other than the ones on that list.

For my summer freebie, I’m going to do Audiobooks for Your Summer Road Trip. This summer I’m traveling like crazy. I have weddings/bachelorette parties, birthdays, and vacations filling up my calendar, and so I really rely on audiobooks to get me through the long drives. Not all audiobooks are created equal, so I’m going to let you know which ones I think you pass on and which ones you should press play.

*Disclaimer: I have not listened to all of these, but the one’s I haven’t, come highly recommended to me

This one is for the kids (and really the adults, too). This beautiful rendition of The Selfish Giant is one everyone should hear. Not only is the narration amazing, it is set to a symphony that elevates the story. I bought it for my nephews and they always ask for it when they are in the car.

*Indicates I have not listened to this particular audiobook, but that it come highly recommended to me.

So there you have it, the 10 Audiobooks I recommend for your summer road trips! Happy reading (or listening), and I can’t wait to read all the other TTT lists for today!

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1939 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown

Rating: ★★★★★ // History lesson that reads like fiction

Favorite Line: “All were merged into one smoothly working machine; they were, in fact, a poem of motion, a symphony of swinging blades.”

Review:

During the years which stood on the eve of WWII, a group of young men thought not of going off to war, or even of making their everlasting mark on history, instead their thoughts were on a narrow long boat in the cold waters at Washington University. This boat became an extension of their bodies, their most treasured possession, and before they knew it, their ticket to the 1939 Olympic Games to represent their country in Berlin.

GoodReads Summary

Daniel James Brown’s robust book tells the story of the University of Washington’s 1936 eight-oar crew and their epic quest for an Olympic gold medal, a team that transformed the sport and grabbed the attention of millions of Americans. The sons of loggers, shipyard workers, and farmers, the boys defeated elite rivals first from eastern and British universities and finally the German crew rowing for Adolf Hitler in the Olympic games in Berlin, 1936.

The emotional heart of the story lies with one rower, Joe Rantz, a teenager without family or prospects, who rows not for glory, but to regain his shattered self-regard and to find a place he can call home. The crew is assembled by an enigmatic coach and mentored by a visionary, eccentric British boat builder, but it is their trust in each other that makes them a victorious team. They remind the country of what can be done when everyone quite literally pulls together—a perfect melding of commitment, determination, and optimism.

Drawing on the boys’ own diaries and journals, their photos and memories of a once-in-a-lifetime shared dream, The Boys in the Boat is an irresistible story about beating the odds and finding hope in the most desperate of times—the improbable, intimate story of nine working-class boys from the American west who, in the depths of the Great Depression, showed the world what true grit really meant. It will appeal to readers of Erik Larson, Timothy Egan, James Bradley, and David Halberstam’s The Amateurs.

I would have never thought a book about a rowing team could be so amazing. While the story is very different, this book feels like Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken. This story is non-fiction, yet it reads like a historical fiction novel…a very detailed and well written historical fiction. By the middle I was soaking up all the information about the rowing team, and by the end I felt like the biggest rowing team in the world, and felt very invested in the collegiate rowing rivalries.

The best parts of the story follow Joe Rantz, a hard-working boy who had fallen on the wrong side of luck many times. He was an unlikely hero of the rowing team, but the amazing thing is that his crew mates were all untraditional rowers. They were all blue collar kids, barely making it into college, barely staying in college, but yet somehow made it on the country’s best rowing team.

“Harmony, balance, and rhythm. They’re the three things that stay with you your whole life. Without them civilization is out of whack. And that’s why an oarsman, when he goes out in life, he can fight it, he can handle life. That’s what he gets from rowing.”

This story is very detailed and precise, which makes it seem like you are watching it as a movie and not reading it. The narrative is beautiful and it fills you with pride for these boys. The characters are so real and alive, you feel as if you were one of the fans watching their races in live time, or the ones all over the country listening to their races on the radio. You feel pain with them, you struggle with their doubts and their anxieties, and you feel elevated with their triumphs and joys.

It’s hard to pinpoint who is really the most important character of the story, because, like rowing, the book relies on so many different characters to make the story work. Any one character could not impact the end as they did without any of the others. They boys work off each other, and they thrive from their mentors, coaches, loved ones, and countrymen.

“Rowing is perhaps the toughest of sports. Once the race starts, there are no time-outs, no substitutions. It calls upon the limits of human endurance. The coach must therefore impart the secrets of the special kind of endurance that comes from mind, heart, and body.

—George Yeoman Pocock”

This is not like many WWII books, because it really does not speak much of the upcoming war. It addresses it, and of course the Olympic games take place at the beginning of the Nazi era, but the lack of the war was so important to the message of the book. These boys were normal, everyday kids. They had pains and troubles, joys and amazements. They had dreams like any other, and like many boys of that age, they had the small bit of dread in their stomach that all their hopes and dreams could be crushed with the impending war.

“The wood…taught us about survival, about overcoming difficulty, about prevailing over adversity, but it also taught us something about the underlying reason for surviving in the first place. Something about infinite beauty, about undying grace, about things larger and greater than ourselves. About the reasons we were all here.”

This reality was worldwide. Millions of people were impacted by the war, but first, before it all began, 9 boys in a boat, backed by their entire country, were able to grasp their dreams and ensure their spot in history.

“Standing there, watching them, it occurred to me that when Hitler watched Joe and the boys fight their way back from the rear of the field to sweep ahead of Italy and Germany seventy-five years ago, he saw, but did not recognize, heralds of his doom. He could not have known that one day hundreds of thousands of boys just like them, boys who shared their essential natures—decent and unassuming, not privileged or favored by anything in particular, just loyal, committed, and perseverant—would return to Germany dressed in olive drab, hunting him down.”

Summer is almost here!! Now is the time to get those summer reading lists going! I personally like conquering long books in the summer but sometimes you find yourself in a hammock all day and just need something short to read and fully escape into, and so for today’s Friday Five, in going to tell you some of my favorite short summer reads!

1. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

While this book is so popular, it really is my ultimate summer read. I love to sit on a porch with a drink and read this book on a hot summer day. I don’t know what it is about the story that brings out the summer in me, maybe it’s the drama, maybe it’s the heat, but I can’t resist reading it at some point during the summer.

2. The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

This one would be a great hammock read. It brings you on an adventure, and it does it quickly. Plus, it has the “summer night” feel to it.

3. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

I first read this book in the middle of the summer on a hot train from Spain to Belgium, so I can personally confirm that it does well in heat. It’s a short, very funny book, that will make you want to travel in space.

4. The Alchamist by Paulo Coelho

This is for those who like to think while they relax. This book deals with life questions, and dives into philosophy and theology from time to time. However, it doesn’t dive to far, so it is still an enjoyable quick read for your summer day.

5. The Giver by Lois Lowry

For most of you this would be a re-read (if you went through the U.S. public school system), but it is a good one to re-visit. I remember the first time I reread this book and it was a completely different book then the one I remembered. While it’s not exactly a pleasant book, it is thought provoking and fascinating.

Reviewing Shakespeare feels a little absurd. I sadly have not studied his plays enough to really grasp all that he is saying, but I hope one day to say that I have. All I can really say is if I liked they play or if I didn’t like the play. When it comes to The Tempest, one of Shakespeare’s last plays (many believe to be his absolute last), I really enjoyed it.

Summary (via GoodReads)

In The Tempest, long considered one of Shakespeare’s most lyrical plays, Prospero—a magician on an enchanted island—punishes his enemies, brings happiness to his daughter, and comes to terms with human use of supernatural power. The Tempest embodies both seemingly timeless romance and the historically specific moment in which Europe begins to explore and conquer the New World.

Its complexity of thought, its range of characters—from the spirit Ariel and the monster Caliban to the beautiful Miranda and her prince Ferdinand -its poetic beauty, and its exploration of difficult questions that still haunt us today make this play wonderfully compelling.

The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place, using illusion and skilful manipulation. The eponymous tempest brings to the island Prospero’s usurping brother Antonio and the complicit Alonso, King of Naples. There, his machinations bring about the revelation of Antonio’s low nature, the redemption of Alonso, and the marriage of Miranda to Alonso’s son, Ferdinand.

I sometimes struggle when reading plays, so I almost always read and listen at the same time. This helps bring the verse to life, while putting the words more firmly into my mind. This version had a little more of a positive impact on me because the lead role of Prospero was performed by Ian McKellen, who is a tremendous actor and he really only needs to voice to perfectly portray the emotion of the character.

The play brings a serious situation into play, but has fun characters to offset the seriousness. It has a bright romance, which blooms a little too quickly for my liking, but after all, it is Shakespeare. Despite the quickness of the romance, I thought the romance was sweet, and it added a nice aspect to the story.

Overall the story is of revenge which ultimately turns into forgiveness after redemption, but like many of Shakespeare’s plays, it explores the supernatural and the physiological aspects of humanity.

What is really unique and beautiful about this play is the epilogue. There, breaking character, Shakespeare has Prospero address the audience. Through Prospero’s voice, Shakespeares talks of his own retirement and of setting his gift of verse free.

I’m going to have to read this play a few more times before I really understand all the different dynamics it has, and maybe then I can write a more intelligent review about it, but as for now, I will just leave you with Shakespeare’s fantastic end:

Now my charms are all o’erthrown,

And what strength I have’s mine own,

Which is most faint. Now, ’tis true,

I must be here confined by you,

Or sent to Naples. Let me not,

Since I have my dukedom got

And pardoned the deceiver, dwell

In this bare island by your spell,

But release me from my bands

With the help of your good hands.

Gentle breath of yours my sails

Must fill, or else my project fails,

Which was to please. Now I want

Spirits to enforce, art to enchant,

And my ending is despair,

Unless I be relieved by prayer,

Which pierces so that it assaults

Mercy itself and frees all faults.

As you from crimes would pardoned be,

Let your indulgence set me free.

*I read this book for my Classics Club challenge. To see my entire list of my challenge Click Here, to learn more about the Classics Club challenge, Click Here.